Where Liberalism Is Alive and Well!

Day: September 14, 2010

For years, Republicans have used the media to create new realities. They do it by using repetition and by spreading the message far and wide. They of course have set up many venues for spreading their talking points and alternate realities, Rush Limbaugh and countless other right-wing radio hosts, Fox News’ entire programming, CNN is played like a cheap violin because they bend over backwards to give two sides to every issue, including facts and MSNBC has an obsession with polls even more than the rest of the cable news networks. They don’t seem to care much who commissioned the poll and whether the methodology was sound or not. New polls get them all excited and they love them some lower thirds graphics that scream the latest poll results.

From my perspective, I’ve watched as the Republicans went from being completely marginalized, losing control of both branches of government and having no real leaders, which continues to this day – to somehow being ahead in generic polls and now the pundits are saying they are going to take control of the House of Representatives in November. How did they do it? By forming a unified front and setting out to block every single thing that the Obama administration attempts, by feeding misinformation into the psyche of the American electorate, by throwing red meat to the uninformed masses with all sorts of subtle and not so subtle appeals to racism, by outright lying with the help of the idiot media and the hired right-wing media, by forcing the administration to the middle with their unified front which has caused the White House to negotiate with the conservadems and moderate Republicans in order to pass ANYTHING, which has caused the “firebaggers” like Jane Hamser, Cenk Uygur, Ed Schultz, Taylor Marsh and Arianna Huffington to start attacking him from the left flank. This has served to demoralize the base with some of those turncoats actually encouraging their readers to not turn out to vote in November, as if that will somehow teach the White House a lesson. The “professional left” completely fell for the Republican’s tactic, swallowed it hook, line and sinker. The Republicans counted on the politically naive Hamsher, Huffington and others to not understand how Washington works, you can read it almost daily on their blogs – this sense that if the president really wanted to pass it, he would just do it. How fucking naive is that thinking, haven’t they ever watched C-Span for more than 5 minutes? I heard Arianna Huffington “GlennBecking” her book last night with full-throated populism and Tom Ashbrook asked how she proposes we change these things and her response was that we have to “insist” that they do it. A perfect example of her naiveté.

The fight over the health care bill is a perfect example of how the Republicans manipulated the process to get back in a position to “possibly” win back the House of Representatives in 2010. We all remember how popular the idea of passing health care reform was right after the election in 2008. This is where the pollsters started their role in helping the Republicans. They all asked very general questions like “Do you support reforming health care?” or something to that effect and of course that general question is going to get a yes answer from many different people, those who want universal health care to those who really don’t know what they want, but just know that what we have now isn’t working. So the pollsters set the high water mark on the popularity of health care reform in its generic form. This helps to set up false expectations of people, especially the media who are lazy motherfuckers and instead of doing some original reporting, they just get the latest PDF from Gallup and recycle the same clichés that they all spew forth. With these high expectations it becomes the media’s job to chip away at it. They love them some dramatic teases or scrolling text which screams “The President’s Support For Health Care Plummets” or some crap like that.

Of course the Republican lie machine kicked into gear and started scaring senior citizens with the “death panels” and injected the terms “government run health care” into the lexicon, even though none of the proposals had government running anything except possibly a public option for buying insurance. But of course the Rebubs, with the help of the media AND the idiot firebaggers, began their campaigns to misinform the public by distorting the bills being floated. The right did it by making people believe that the government was going to decide what procedures would or wouldn’t be covered and the firebaggers did it by attacking the mandate, which by most accounts is necessary, if we are really going to bring costs down…think emergency room visits for uninsured. Of course, the firebaggers claimed it was going to be a big gain for insurance companies, which may or may not be true when you consider all the other provisions that put restrictions on them and stop them from kicking people off for pre-existing conditions, etc., I’m not so sure the insurance companies will benefit as much as the haters think. It is probably true that the more people who have health insurance, the more the insurance industry stands to gain from it. So when you step back, the firebaggers would rather the health insurance industry not make money, even if it means poor people suffer. Where are the priorities here, supposed “left”? And really, having observed how things really work in Washington, the congress can revisit a lot of these issues in the future and as long as Democrats stay in control, much of that can be fixed. But here is the rub. The firebaggers who should be supporting the president and helping to fix the problems with the bill are actively trying to bring this president down. Do they really care about progressive issues or have their emotions (hate and jealousy) overcome their ability to reason and show compassion for their fellow citizens? Bastards.

If we look at the other big lie that Republicans have successfully perpetuated with the help of the media and again, the firebaggers, is the idea that the stimulus didn’t work…all based on one measure, the unemployment rate. I’ve posted about this before so I won’t rehash it…go look at it if you haven’t already. Almost immediately after President Obama was elected, before he was even sworn in, someone in the Obama gang made a prediction about the unemployment rate based on the numbers Bush and Co. were giving them. Remember how everyone was demanding that Obama come up with a solution to the economic mess and solve the looming “depression” that was surely around the corner…even before he was sworn in. So bowing to that intense pressure, a big mistake, the incoming administration made some rosy statements based on the information available. These predictions were modified very soon after the real numbers were discovered, after the Bush folks walked away laughing that they fell for it. But the Republicans, the media and the haters on the left (firebaggers) apparently didn’t like those new numbers so they just stayed with the Bush inspired ones, it served their purposes much better. So here we are 20 months later, no depression, the stock market back near the 10,000 mark, massive profits in the pockets of business and new private sector jobs being created for the last 8 months…not enough for sure, but a lot better than the legacy Bush left us and of course all that positive news is overshadowed by the unemployment rate. No one seems to grasp that it could very well be 18 – 20% had the stimulus not been passed. How many times have you heard someone in the media brush that off because damnit, there are still a lot of unemployed people. No shit Sherlock, and it does matter that it could be much worse….it does matter. Especially for all those people who still have their jobs and can pay their bills, it really fucking matters. Oh, but let’s ignore them because someone made a prediction back in December of 2008 that was wrong. Let’s just focus on that one number as the measure, fucking idiots.

But having said all that, it doesn’t mean that Democrats have to lose in November. With such a large percentage of the population not paying attention to politics at all until about 2 weeks out from an election, with the right tactics, we can minimize those loses and retain control of both houses of congress. I’m encouraged that David Plouffe is on our team and actively organizing and pushing for the GOTV efforts. I’m also glad to see the President out delivering the message that no one else seems to have the balls to do, including the firebaggers and the so-called “professional left” who in my opinion, hasn’t done shit for progressive causes since President Obama took office. They’ve been whining and bitching about the president not fulfilling some fantasy they created in their pea-sized brains or they are out to prove that we all should have voted for Hillary by joining with the right to damage this progressive president. Fucking sore losers……well, losers period.

So it is up to the rest of us to help the Democrats save our country from the catastrophe that will surely happen if John Boehner and Mitch McConnell get control. Go out and do your part to elect Democrats, start today. It isn’t that hard, talk to your liberal friends and make sure they are going to vote this year. If you have the time, volunteer for your local democrats and post comments on blogs encouraging people to get out and vote. We can win this thing if we all do our part.